Huge breaches can give hackers a door into other sites When Yahoo said on Thursday that data from at least 500 million user accounts had been hacked, it wasn’t just admitting to a huge failing in data security — it was admitting to the biggest hack the world has ever seen. Until Thursday, the previous largest known hack was the 2008 breach that hit almost 360 million MySpace accounts, according to a ranking by the “Have I been pwned” website. Like the Yahoo breach, the hack was only publicly disclosed this year after data was offered on a hacker forum. And only three breaches had ranked above the 100 million level: LinkedIn reported a loss of 167 million email addresses and passwords. They were originally stolen in 2012 but not publicly disclosed until 2016, again after the data was offered on an underground “dark market” site. A 2013 hack of Adobe saw 153 million account details lost. They included user names, email addresses, and encrypted passwords, but the encryption was poorly implemented and reversed on some accounts. And there’s been a reported but unverified hack of dating website Badoo. Data including email addresses, names, and passwords for about112 million members was found online. The LinkedIn and MySpace data sets, along with 200 million Yahoo records, were put up for sale by the same hacker, peace_of_mind. Major hacks can turn out to be a headache for users, even if the data is old and the account in question is no longer used. That’s because many people use the same password or a similar password across services, so a successful hack of Yahoo could expose an email address and password that would work on other sites. And if you think the numerous, continuous hacks of major websites have pushed people to exercise better password security, consider this. These are the top 10 passwords associated with the 153 million hacked Adobe accounts and the number of accounts that used then. 123456 — 1,911,938 123456789 — 446,162 password — 345,834 adobe123 — 211,659 12345678 — 201,580 qwerty — 130,832 1234567 — 124,253 111111 — 113,884 photoshop — 83,411 123123 — 82,694 Related content how-to Download our Zero Trust network access (ZTNA) enterprise buyer’s guide From the editors of Network World, this enterprise buyer’s guide helps network and security IT staff understand what ZTNA can do for their organizations and how to choose the right solution. By Josh Fruhlinger and Steve Zurier May 06, 2024 1 min Network Security Enterprise Buyer’s Guides news Network jobs watch: Hiring, skills and certification trends What IT leaders need to know about expanding responsibilities, new titles and hot skills for network professionals and I&O teams. By Denise Dubie May 06, 2024 6 mins Careers Data Center Networking feature IBM’s bets on AI and hybrid cloud pay off Three key differentiators of IBM’s AI and cloud offerings are cross-platform automation, integration with multiple clouds, and tie-ins to IBM professional services. By Jeff Vance May 06, 2024 9 mins Hybrid Cloud Network Management Software Cloud Computing analysis What is a virtual machine, and why are they so useful? Many of today’s IT innovations have their roots in virtual machines (VM) and their ability to separate software from hardware. By Keith Shaw May 03, 2024 9 mins Virtualization Data Center Networking PODCASTS VIDEOS RESOURCES EVENTS NEWSLETTERS Newsletter Promo Module Test Description for newsletter promo module. Please enter a valid email address Subscribe